Sarasota musicians notch a victory in noise battle

Published: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 at 9:54 a.m.

Last Modified: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 at 9:54 a.m.

SARASOTA - Live music enthusiasts, business advocates and an American Civil Liberties Union representative turned out at City Hall on Tuesday to ask — and in the case of the ACLU member, warn — commissioners to change the rules on outdoor amplified music.

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The ACLU representative, Michael Barfield, told the city its zoning code, which bans any amplified music in restaurants' outdoor seating areas, is unconstitutional. The local ACLU chapter previously sued Sarasota for a noise ordinance regulating music in vehicles, claiming the measure impinged on First Amendment rights.

On Tuesday, Barfield asked commissioners to “to avoid litigation and to take a serious look at the constitutionality of those provisions in your code.”

Commissioners responded by asking city staff to send out an email that evening prohibiting staff members from enforcing that part of the zoning code.

“He came down here and told us we had a problem,” Commissioner Shannon Snyder said, encouraging the commission to act quickly. “I don't want to be writing another check.”

The Department of Neighborhood and Development Services enforces the zoning code.

The commission's decision comes a week and a half after the department's general manager, Gretchen Schneider, sent a letter to more than 200 restaurant owners citing the zoning code and said no amplified music is allowed in their outdoor seating areas, like patios and rooftops.

Schneider said she decided to send out the letter after the city received numerous complaints about amplified music. Many people did not know about the rules and have called her with questions, she said.

Part of the confusion could be because the city's zoning code regulations for outdoor music at restaurants conflicts with Sarasota's noise ordinance, which allows the amplified music during certain hours and below certain decibel levels.

City police will continue to enforce the hours and decibel levels in the city ordinance.

Many restaurants and bars offer live outdoor music during the hours that the ordinance allows, including Eat Here Sarasota, where Twinkle Schaschle Ursula Yochim, whose stage name is simply “Twinkle,” performs Wednesday through Saturday. She was among the artists who attended Tuesday's meeting.

“We're all so frustrated,” Yochim said. “I have just realized that my financial survival is and always has been linked to this.”

“This is our town, too,” Yochim said. “And my family is four generations Sarasota, full-time residents, not transients. The musicians that have had to leave to find work are brilliant sons and daughters of this town. This is ridiculous.”

Sarasota resident Suzette Jones, who works at a business consulting firm, told commissioners she is a “music lover” who believes it's time to move forward with changes that embrace the local music scene.

“I'm attending mostly to show support, to have a presence and show that people like me who live downtown want live music,” Jones said before the meeting. “I think there's a vocal minority. The city government doesn't hear us because we're not the complainers.”

The debate over how the city should regulate sound has popped up time and again over the years. The conversation often pits people pushing for louder and later entertainment downtown against residents seeking peace.

“Most of my clients won't come to Sarasota because it's so hard to do business,” Jones said. “It's these old, old, rules that don't work in today's Sarasota.”

Commissioner Paul Caragiulo also called the city zoning code rules for outdoor music outdated, and said he was surprised by Schneider's letter saying they would be enforced.

“The current way that it's written in the zoning code is not acceptable and needs to be changed,” Caragiulo said. “Frankly, it's just yet another sort of example of a zoning code that's better suited as an artifact in an archaeology museum.”

Caragiulo began holding community discussions on the noise ordinance in October, and said he was spurred to action by This Week in Sarasota writer and local activist Anthony Paull.

Paull was one of the people asking members of the local music scene to turn out Tuesday at the commission meeting to ask for change.

On March 4, Caragiulo will present a report of what he heard from the community to the other commissioners, and said he will ask them to begin the process of changing how the city regulates noise.

Staff Writer Wade Tatangelo contributed to this story.

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